Gay pair kiss and tell after London pub boots them

BRITAIN

Published 4:00 am, Friday, April 15, 2011

(04-16) 04:00 PDT London - --

Two gay men say their first-date kiss got them thrown out of a London pub - and turned them into a Twitter sensation.

Jonathan Williams says he and his date, James Bull, were asked to leave after sharing what they described as a "hands-on-the-table" kiss at the John Snow pub in London's Soho, normally known as one of London's gay-friendliest neighborhoods. Anger snowballed after Williams tweeted about the incident late Wednesday, and within 24 hours, the story was on the front page of Britain's Guardian newspaper, and the pair were describing their ordeal on national radio.

A number for the John Snow - named after a 19th century English physician - rang unanswered Friday. The pub closed its doors Friday afternoon after hundreds signed up to a Facebook group promising a three-hour "kiss-in" at the Snow. That didn't stop the protesters. A raucous crowd of about 300 mostly gay men joined Williams and Bull outside the pub Friday evening, many embracing and kissing each other in front of a large media presence, and a rainbow flag was draped outside the closed door.

The kiss-in's organizer, a 50-year-old manager named Paul Shetler, said he first heard about the incident through Twitter. Shetler, who is originally from New York, said the incident "struck me as the kind of thing I would see in a small town in the States, not in the capital of the U.K."

But gay advocates said those kinds of snubs weren't uncommon, even in cosmopolitan areas such as Soho.

Attitudes toward homosexuality are generally relaxed in Britain, where civil partnerships are accorded the same legal standing as marriages, and politicians of all stripes eagerly emphasize their gay-friendly credentials.